Libyan rebels fear rift after death of Abdel Fatah YounisQuestions raised over circumstances of Younis's death amid speculation he may have been killed by gunmen on his own side

The death of the Libyan rebels' chief of army staff, Abdel Fatah Younis, has raised fears of a rift within opposition forces amid speculation that he may have been killed by gunmen on his own side.

The president of the National Transition Council (NTC), Abdul Mustafa Jalil, announced on Thursday night that Younis had been assassinated by pro-Gaddafi agents. But the lack of detail, and the fact that earlier that day Younis had been arrested on the orders of Jalil, have raised questions about the circumstances of his death.

Jalil said that rebels had arrested the head of the group behind the attack but the bodies of Younis, Muammar Gaddafi's former interior minister, and two colonels also killed in the alleged ambush have not been found.

The rebels said earlier on Thursday that Younis had been arrested on suspicion that his family might still have ties to the Gaddafi regime. Rumours swirled that he was involved in unauthorised contact with the administration he dramatically abandoned in February or had even helped to supply Gaddafi troops with weapons.

Before the announcement of his death, armed men declaring their support for Younis appeared on the streets of Benghazi claiming they would use force to free him from NTC custody.

Minutes after Jalil's statement at a chaotic late-night press conference at a hotel in Benghazi, gunfire broke out in the street outside. Members of Younis's tribe, the Obeidi, one of the largest in the east, fired machine guns and smashed windows, forcing security guards and hotel guests to duck for cover.

A tribal split within the opposition could prove catastrophic and plays on western fears of a civil war over Libya's oil resources – a possibility raised by Gaddafi.

The discord comes a day after the foreign secretary, William Hague, said Britain would recognise the NTC as the legitimate government of Libya and painted a rosy picture of the opposition forces in Libya, praising their "increasing legitimacy, competence and success".

Adding to the confusion, a security officer, Fadlallah Haroun, told the Associated Press before Jalil's announcement that security had found three badly burned people. Two of them were dead and one was unconscious, Fadlallah said, adding that one was known to be Younis, though they didn't know which one.

Jalil said Younis had been "summoned" for questioning on "a military matter" but had not yet been questioned when he was killed. Jalil said it was "with regret" he had to announce the death of Younis and called him "one of the heroes of the 17th of February revolution".

Younis was not universally trusted within opposition ranks. Many were suspicious of his past links to the Gaddafi regime and troops in the besieged city of Misrata have conspicuously refused to accept orders from him, to the extent of insisting that their fighters are not part of the Benghazi-controlled national rebel army.

During an interview in April Gaddafi's daughter, Aisha, suggested that Younis was still loyal to her father and declined to answer when asked if the former interior minister was still in touch with her family.

Younis reportedly nearly came to blows with his rival for the army command, Klalifa Hefter, during a meeting in late March. For much of that month both men claimed to be in command of the ragtag rebel forces as they raced west towards Tripoli, only to be thrown back towards Benghazi in chaos and confusion.

By April Younis had won the political battle inside the NTC and was confirmed as chief of staff. But he failed to use his new position to bring victory on the battlefield. Since April the frontline has remained largely in stalemate despite heavy Nato bombing of government forces around the key oil town of Brega.

Younis had been one of Gaddafi's most trusted officials and confidants. The general's friendship with Gaddafi dated from 1969 when he joined a group of fresh-faced army officers in deposing Libya's king.

But when riots came to the streets of Benghazi in February he dramatically switched sides, joining the rebels and bringing the city's interior ministry military brigade with him.

In March of this year, the US, France, Britain and their North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) allies launched military operations in Libya under the guise of a "humanitarian intervention". US diplomats and world leaders carelessly voiced unsubstantiated claims of an impending massacre in Benghazi. You hear no such appeals to humanity while Nato, in the name of the rebels (whoever they are), prepares to lay siege in Tripoli, a city of nearly 2 million people.

Libyan rebels are now advancing on the capital city of Tripoli with the aid of Nato strikes; this is sure to result in a real bloodbath, as opposed to the one that was conjured in Benghazi this past winter. Nato is assisting rebels who are blocking food, water and medical supplies from coming into the capital city, and is stopping those who need advanced medical care from travelling to Tunisia to access it. Nato is bombing power stations, creating blackouts, and using Apache helicopters to attack Libyan police checkpoints to clear roads for rebels to advance.

Regardless of whether Muammar Gaddafi is ousted in coming days, the war against Libya has seen countless violations of United Nations security council resolutions (UNSCRs) by Nato and UN member states. The funnelling of weapons (now being air-dropped) to Libyan rebels was, from the beginning of the conflict, in clear violation of UNSCR 1970. The use of military force on behalf of the rebels, in an attempt to impose regime change, has undermined international law and damaged the credibility of the United Nations. Countless innocent civilians have been killed, and Nato air strikes continue to place many at great risk.

So much for the humanitarian-inspired UNSCR 1973 as a means to protect civilians. The people of Libya cannot take another month of such humanitarian intervention.

The leading donor nations of Nato – the US, France and Great Britain – have been free to prosecute war under the cloak of this faceless, bureaucratic, alphabet security agency, now multinational war machine, which can violate UN resolutions and kill innocent civilians with impunity. War crimes trials are only for losers. The prospective conquerors, the western powers and their rebel proxies, will then expect to be able to assert control over Libya's vast oil and natural gas reserves.

The US share of the war against Libya has probably exceeded the $1bn mark. This extraordinary amount of money for an intervention that Americans were told would last "days not weeks" could only be explained by looking at the war as an investment, and at control over Libya's wealth as an opportunity to make a return on that investment. Cynical? Then tell me why else we are at war in Libya.

Viable peace proposals, such as the one put forward by the African Union (AU), have been quickly and summarily rejected. If there is going to be a peaceful resolution of the conflict, the US must work with and empower the AU to ensure regional security. The AU has proposed a peace plan that would facilitate an immediate ceasefire, the unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid, a dialogue between the Transitional National Council and the Gaddafi government, and the suspension of Nato strikes.

The use of force and ultimatums has not worked. As the war enters its sixth month, it is time for the US president and secretary of state to clean up the mess they've created with this needless military intervention, and to work to seriously to bring about a negotiated end to this war.

In June, I proposed a peace plan (pdf) derived in part from the efforts of the AU. This plan calls for an immediate ceasefire and lays out the principles necessary to create a framework to achieve reconciliation and national unity in Libya by a meaningful process. In its June report on Libya, the International Crisis Group stated:

"A political breakthrough is by far the best way out of the costly situation created by the military impasse. This will require a ceasefire between the regime and the Transitional National Council, the deployment of a peacekeeping force to monitor and guarantee this under a UN mandate, and the immediate opening of serious negotiations between regime and opposition representatives to secure agreement on a peaceful transition to a new, more legitimate political order. Nato and those states supporting its military action should facilitate this development, not hinder it."

I have recently received several reports indicating that a settlement was close, only to be scuttled by state department officials. Given that the department of state seems to have taken a singular role in launching the US into this war, it is more than disconcerting to hear that the same agency has played a role in frustrating a resolution to this conflict. There are viable solutions to peacefully end the conflict, if there is a desire to do so.

Continued military action promotes a cycle of violence that will persist whether Colonel Gaddafi is ousted or not. On 19 March 2003, the United States pursued regime change in Iraq. Eight years later, we're still wondering why the people of Iraq are not sufficiently grateful for our intervention, which has resulted in the death of over 1 million of their fellow countrymen and women.

How can we expect this grim manifesto of interventionism to ever result in anything but tragedy? It's time to end the war against Libya.

I have to wonder just who these rebels are myself. I mean, without the NATO air strikes, would this rebel force have stood a chance?
Was this a popular uprising of the people?
If so, why does the UN have to step in with such drastic help (at the cost of the resolution put in place being compromised)?

I have to wonder just who these rebels are myself. I mean, without the NATO air strikes, would this rebel force have stood a chance?Was this a popular uprising of the people?If so, why does the UN have to step in with such drastic help (at the cost of the resolution put in place being compromised)?

Somebody is getting something out of it. Cash or gash. Follow the trail.

At this point for me, it really isn't what these people are doing, as much as it is important for them to just come fucking clean about their goals. Many already realize that as soon as something like this goes down, there is a reason far beyond what is stated to the public. As the world turns and the power elite continue to maneuver themselves lawlessly throughout countries, it has become alarmingly evident that 1)most people have stopped paying attention anyway and 2) those who are aren't being fooled by the false pretenses offered up for something like this.

We sat back and watched how Iraq unfolded, and I for one am ashamed at what went down and how it was portrayed for so long. It's almost impossible to look back at the occupation of Iraq with any regard for its stated purpose. (and it is still going on)

We already know they lie and lie big. Why not just be fucking honest about it and state the goals?
Those of us who care are powerless to stop it, and everyone else stopped paying attention anyway.

Gaddafi's once powerful son, Saif al-Islam, made a defiant appearance in Tripoli on Monday night to disprove the revolutionaries' claim to have arrested him and to proclaim ultimate victory.

Saif al-Islam, 39, arrived in an armoured vehicle waving two fingers in a victory sign at a hotel where foreign journalists are staying in an area of the Libyan capital still under the regime's control.

"I am here to refute the lies [that he had been arrested]," he said.

As the revolutionaries consolidated their control over most of Tripoli and continued their hunt for Libya's dictator, the younger Gaddafi and one-time heir apparent said his father had not fled the city.

The BBC described Saif al-Islam as "confident and full of adrenalin". He said the rebels had fallen into "a trap" and would be defeated.

"You have seen how the Libyan people rose up together, men and women, to break the backbone of the rebels, rats and gangs yesterday and today," he was reported to have said.

He then took reporters on a drive in an armoured convoy through areas of the city still under the regime's control including the Gaddafi family compound and military barracks where scores of men waited to receive guns to join the fighting.

"We are going to hit the hottest spots in Tripoli," he said.

The revolutionaries claimed to have arrested three of Gaddafi's sons as they seized control of Tripoli. Saif al-Islam's detention was confirmed by the prosecutor of the international criminal court (ICC), Luis Moreno-Ocampo, who is seeking to have him extradited to stand trial at The Hague for crimes against humanity over the violence unleashed by the regime against the uprising in which hundreds of unarmed people were shot. The ICC alleges that Saif al-Islam drew up and implemented the plan to violently put down the rebellion.

Asked about the ICC indictment, he said: "Screw the criminal court."

During the tour of the regime-controlled parts of the city, he offered a rambling explanation for the rebels' swift success in seizing much of Tripoli in part by accusing Nato and the west of an electronic assault.

"They sent text messages to the Libyan people through the Libyana [mobile phone] network. They stopped our broadcast transmission. They perpetuated an electronic and media war in order to spread chaos and fear in Libya. Also they brought gangs from the sea and by car to Tripoli," he told AP television.

Al-Jazeera reported that another of Gaddafi's sons, Muhammad, who was arrested by rebels on Sunday, was believed to have escaped from rebel custody.

Once again a defiant Qaddafi has prevailed against the full might of NATO aggression including a murderous bombing campaign followed by NATO special forces on the ground supporting mobs of US/UK/French/Qatari backed Al Qaeda thugs which swarmed Tripoli over the weekend. “Illustrious” news agencies from the Qatari government’s AlJazeera, to the now exposed frauds at CNN, BBC, Reuters, AP, AFP have been caught perpetuating a concerted war propaganda campaign in order to break the will of both Libya and in particular Tripoli.

Reports that Qaddafi’s son Saif Al-Islam was “captured” by Libyan rebels by the disingenuous media outlets and “confirmed” by the Fortune 500 contrived International Criminal Court (ICC), who went as far as saying preparations were already under way to transfer Saif to the Hague,are now confirmed lies with Saif Al-Islam very much free, appearing to journalists at the Rixos Hotel in southern Tripoli flanked by Libyan military forces and very much leading what appears to be a significant Libyan government counterattack. It appears that NATO operations are ending just as they began, based on a verified pack of lies. (Please see March’s “Libya: Another War, Another Pack of Lies“)Everything we have been told, from President Obama’s teleprompter readings to Luis Moreno-Ocampo of the ICC’s claims of Saif’s “confirmed” capture, to the mainstream media and the Al Qaeda infested “Transitional National Council” are now systematically being exposed as overt, verified lies as part of what may be the biggest psychological operation in modern history. Al Jazeera who was already featuring lofty “The Last Days of Gaddafi” narratives is now forced to face reality and irrefutable evidence that the rebel operations in Tripoli were clearly over-hyped war propaganda and the reality is Qaddafi and the Libyan people have called NATO’s bluff.To illustrate just how absurd the Western media has become as their lies break upon the rocks of reality, a recent farcical attempt to save face regarding Saif’s appearance before journalists at the Riox included an Al Jazeera report claiming that rebel leaders had confirmation Saif al-Islam was arrested “but have no idea how he escaped.” To help out the media it might be suggested that Saif was never captured in the first place and that reports of his arrest were simply a ploy to embolden rebels and make it appear as if the momentum had swung in favor of NATO. (For more on US State Department lies rehashed through “media” please see: “Libyan Rebels Lying Left and Right“)

Image: Here, the International Criminal Court “confirms” the now verified lie that Saif Al-Islam was being held by rebels. ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, in a fit of unmitigated lies claimed, “we have confidential information from different sources that we have within Libya confirming this.” He would continue, “it is very important to make clear there is an obligation to surrender Saif to the ICC in accordance with the Security Council resolution.” Along with UN Chief Ban Ki-Moon’s claim that the “international community” is obligated to comply to the ICC we see unfolding a criminal organization of liars and degenerates of unprecedented proportions.

What follows next is unsure. With Council on Foreign Relations president Richard Haas and others calling for an expedient landing of NATO occupation forces it seems they above all others knew just how tenuous the rebels’ hold on Tripoli was. As explained previously, the war in Libya goes beyond pilfering the nation’s material wealth, it is about establishing the Wall Street-London international order and its primacy over the nation-state. A NATO failure in Libya would infinitely complicate planned operations against Syria, Iran, and along Russia and China’s peripheries. While it appears that NATO’s last ditch murder spree has failed, with so much on the table, everything from continuous carpet bombing to a NATO land invasion under the guise of UN “peace monitors” or Haas’ NATO occupation forces are possibilities already being planned.What we do know is how desperate the corporate-financier elite are and how absolute their control is over the mainstream media. Such a large, wide scale disinformation campaign is only possible if each news agency, from AP, Reuters, BBC, Guardian, Telegraph, New York Times, CNN, Al Jazeera and others, are completely compromised by corporate-financier interests. The following lists shows that indeed many of these “news agencies” share consortium memberships with some of the largest corporate-financier interests on earth presenting an immense conflict of interest obviously producing astronomically duplicitous improprieties.Council on Foreign RelationsChatham House (Major Corporate members)Chatham House (Corporate Members)Chatham House (Corporate Partners)Brookings Institution (page 20 of annual report)When we see Reuters sitting side-by-side oil giants like BP, Exxon, Chevron within the halls of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Chatham House and then see reports gloating over Western oil companies moving in to replace Chinese and Russian investments in Libya, their duplicity and lack of independence in their reporting becomes glaringly obvious. These media organizations are in fact PR fronts for the Fortune 500 and their collective goal of implementing a global empire, nation to nation. For now, they are currently obsessed over Libya and the implications its conclusion will have on their future planned conquests, the next being Syria.It would be a good idea for those following the current NATO murder spree in Libya to abandon any trust in Reuters, BBC, CNN, MSNBC, CBS, NBC, ABC, and any of the “reputable” newspapers wasting paper and space on our nations’ newsstands, all of whose fates are tied directly to the corporate-financier interests pinning their hopes on a NATO victory in Libya. Instead, we must commit ourselves to vetting reliable alternative news sources as well as committing ourselves to the responsible of researching the news of the day on our own. Let this be proof positive as to how essential it is to boycott and replace everything eminating from the Fortune 500 including their army of professional liars also known as the “mainstream media.”

They don't give up. For the third time in a decade, British and US forces have played the decisive role in the overthrow of an Arab or Muslim regime. As rebel forces pressed home their advantage across Libya under continuing Nato air support , politicians in London and Paris preened themselves on their role as the midwives of a "new Libya".

It's all supposed to be different this time, of course. The lessons of the west's blood-drenched occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan are said to have been learned: no boots on the ground, UN backing, proper planning and Libyans in the lead. But the echoes of Baghdad and, even more, Kabul have been eerie – and not only in the made-for-TV images of the sacking of compounds and smashing of statues, or the street banners hailing Nato leaders.

As in Afghanistan in 2001, the western powers have taken sides in a civil war, relying on air power and special forces to turn the tide against an unpopular authoritarian regime.

In Libya, the basis for foreign military intervention has been the claim that Muammar Gaddafi's forces were about to carry out a massacre of civilians in Benghazi after he threatened to hunt down armed rebels "house to house". Violent repression was certainly meted out against a popular uprising, but once insurrection had morphed into war there's little evidence that the regime's troops were in a position to overrun an armed and hostile city of 700,000 people. And reports from Amnesty and Human Rights Watch have since cast serious doubt on a string of war atrocity stories used to justify Nato bombing.

But they helped deliver UN resolution 1973, authorising "all necessary means" to protect Libyan civilians. That has since been used as Nato's fig leaf to justify the onslaught against Gaddafi and deliver regime change from the air. And while the western powers claimed to be saving lives, thousands have died on the ground – including uncounted numbers of civilians killed by Nato's own air attacks, such as the 85 reported incinerated near Zlitan earlier this month.

If stopping the killing had been the real aim, Nato states would have backed a ceasefire and a negotiated settlement, rather than repeatedly vetoing both. Instead, after having lost serious strategic ground in the Arab revolutions, the Libyan war offered the US, Britain and France a chance to put themselves at the heart of the process while bringing to heel an unreliable state with the largest oil reserves in Africa.

None of that means the euphoria on the streets of Libyan cities at the fall of a regime long decayed into dynastic despotism isn't entirely genuine. Or that the rebels who fought their way across the country haven't made heavy sacrifices for a victory they regard as their own – let alone that Libyans were incapable of bringing down the Gaddafi regime by themselves.

But the facts are unavoidable.Without the 20,000 air sorties, arms supplies and logistical support of the most powerful states in the world, they would not be calling the shots in Tripoli today. The assault on the capital was supported by the heaviest Nato bombardment to date. Western intelligence and special forces have been on the ground for months – in mockery of the UN – training, planning and co-ordinating rebel operations.

It was the leading Nato states that championed and funded the Transitional National Council – including members with longstanding CIA and MI6 links – and officials from Nato states who drew up the stabilisation plan now being implemented on the ground.

However glad people are to see the fall of the Gaddafi clan, it's clear that such intimate involvement of the US and the former colonial powers taints and undermines the legitimacy of Libya's transformation. They will expect a payback for their investment in the Libyan war: in oil and commercial deals, political support and perhaps even the return of western military bases.

The British government's refusal to rule out sending troops to take part in a "stabilisation operation" is an ominous sign of where Libya may be heading. And if Libyans end up with the kind of democracy foisted on Iraq and Afghanistan, courtesy of their western advisers, that will be no liberation at all.

Beyond Libya, the apparent success of Nato's operation has given an unwelcome boost to the doctrine of pick-and-choose liberal interventionism, just as its dangers had come to be recognised in the wake of the disasters of the war on terror. That matters in the Middle East now more than ever.

Since the Arab revolution despatched two western-backed dictators in quick succession at the start of the year, there has been a three-pronged drive by the west to bring it under control. In Egypt, US and Saudi money has been poured in to suborn it. In Bahrain, conservative Gulf states have been given support to crush the uprising by force. And in Libya, the western powers have attempted to hijack it, while channelling covert support to the brutally repressed opposition in Syria.

There are many in the region who now hope the fall of Gaddafi will give new momentum to the stalled Arab awakening, bringing down another autocrat, perhaps in Yemen. But the risk could instead be that it sends a message that regimes can only now be despatched with the armed support of Washington, London and Paris – available in the most select circumstances.

Nato's intervention in Libya is a threat to the Arab revolution, but the forces that have been unleashed in the region won't be turned back so easily. Many of those who have fought for power in Libya, including Islamists, clearly won't accept the dispensation that's been prepared for them. But only when Nato and its bagmen are forced to leave Libya can Libyans truly take control of their own country.

U.S. and Allies Promise Action on LibyaAuto Start: On | Off
Share301 CommentsPrintSingle PageText Size- / +By JAKE TAPPER (@jaketapper) , HUMA KHAN and MARTHA RADDATZ (@martharaddatz)
March 18, 2011
President Obama told a bipartisan group of members of Congress today that he expects the U.S. would be actively involved in any military action against Libya for "days, not weeks," after which he said the U.S. would take more of a supporting role, sources tell ABC News.

The White House meeting with 18 lawmakers came as Obama delivered an ultimatum to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi that he must immediately implement a ceasefire in all parts of Libya and allow international humanitarian assistance, or risk military action against his regime.

"Moammar Gadhafi has a choice. The [U.N.] resolution that passed lays out very clear conditions that must be met. The United States, the United Kingdom, France and Arab states agree that a ceasefire must be implemented immediately. That means all attacks against civilians must stop," the president said today. "Humanitarian assistance must be allowed to reach the people of Libya."

"These terms are not subject to negotiation," Obama said. "If Gadhafi does not comply with the resolution, the international community will impose consequences and the resolution will be enforced through military action."

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Sources told ABC News that Obama's decision to support the use of force came Tuesday, following several days of internal administration deliberations and the realization that diplomatic efforts to stop the brutality of Gadhafi's regime weren't working.

Presented with intelligence about the push of the Gadhafi regime to the rebel stronghold of Benghazi, the president told his national security team, "What we're doing isn't stopping him."

Some in his administration, such as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, had been pushing for stronger action, but it wasn't until Tuesday, administration sources tell ABC News, that the president became convinced sanctions and the threat of a no-fly zone wouldn't be enough.

Obama's speech Friday indicated that coalition forces are giving Gadhafi time to change course, but are also gearing up for an attack if their demands are not met.

He also reiterated that the potential conflict was international in form, saying that any action in Libya would be led by European and Arab forces, and that no ground troops will be deployed.

"We are not going to use force to go beyond a well-defined goal, specifically the protection of civilians in Libya," he said.

The president is mindful that the American public is weary of war, and that the world community casts a skeptical eye at American plans to take military action against yet another Muslim country. Obama has tried hard not to feed into Gadhafi's megalomaniacal worldview by making this confrontation about him versus Obama, or the United States versus Gadhafi, officials say.

The United States has very much been leading the charge behind the scenes, but the White House has deferred public action to the State Department and the United Nations. The administration has also worked furiously to put a European and Arab face on the opposition to Gadhafi's action.

On Saturday, France will host a high level meeting of representatives from the Arab League and European Union to discuss the implementation of the no-fly zone or targeted strikes inside Libya. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will also attend.

I'm willing to bet the official spokesman response goes something like: "We have no comment at this time. We believe Obrahma has made a good decision for the country. We look forward to our share of the treasures."

Think of the new Libya as the latest spectacular chapter in the Disaster Capitalism series. Instead of weapons of mass destruction, we had R2P ("responsibility to protect"). Instead of neo-conservatives, we had humanitarian imperialists.

But the target is the same: regime change. And the project is the same: to completely dismantle and privatize a nation that was not integrated into turbo-capitalism; to open another (profitable) land of opportunity for turbocharged neo-liberalism. The whole thing is especially handy because it is smack in the middle of a nearly global recession.

It will take some time; Libyan oil won't totally return to the market within 18 months. But there's the reconstruction of everything the

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) bombed (well, not much of what the Pentagon bombed in 2003 was reconstructed in Iraq ...)

Anyway - from oil to rebuilding - in thesis juicy business opportunities loom. France's neo-Napoleonic Nicolas Sarkozy and Britain's David of Arabia Cameron believe they will be especially well positioned to profit from NATO's victory. Yet there's no guarantee the new Libyan bonanza will be enough to lift both former colonial powers (neo-colonials?) out of recession.

President Sarkozy in particular will milk the business opportunities for French companies for all they're worth - part of his ambitious agenda of "strategic redeployment" of France in the Arab world. A compliant French media are gloating that this was "his" war - spinning that he decided to arm the rebels on the ground with French weaponry, in close cooperation with Qatar, including a key rebel commando unit that went by sea from Misrata to Tripoli last Saturday, at the start of "Operation Siren".

Well, he certainly saw the opening when Muammar Gaddafi's chief of protocol defected to Paris in October 2010. That's when the whole regime change drama started to be incubated.

Bombs for oil As previously noted (see Welcome to Libya's 'democracy', Asia Times Online, August 24) the vultures are already circling Tripoli to grab (and monopolize) the spoils. And yes - most of the action has to do with oil deals, as in this stark assertion by Abdeljalil Mayouf, information manager at the "rebel" Arabian Gulf Oil Company; "We don't have a problem with Western countries like the Italians, French and UK companies. But we may have some political issues with Russia, China and Brazil."

These three happen to be crucial members of the BRICS group of emerging economies (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), which are actually growing while the Atlanticist, NATO-bombing economies are either stuck in stagnation or recession. The top four BRICs also happen to have abstained from approving UN Security Council resolution 1973, the no-fly zone scam that metamorphosed into NATO bringing regime change from above. They saw right through it from the beginning.

To make matters worse (for them), only three days before the Pentagon's Africom launched its first 150-plus Tomahawks over Libya, Colonel Gaddafi gave an interview to German TV stressing that if the country were attacked, all energy contracts would be transferred to Russian, Indian and Chinese companies.

So the winners in the oil bonanza are already designated: NATO members plus Arab monarchies. Among the companies involved, British Petroleum (BP), France's Total and the Qatar national oil company. For Qatar - which dispatched jet fighters and recruiters to the front lines, trained "rebels" in exhaustive combat techniques, and is already managing oil sales in eastern Libya - the war will reveal itself to be a very wise investment decision.

Prior to the months-long crisis that is in its end game now with the rebels in the capital, Tripoli, Libya was producing 1.6 million barrels per day. Once resumed, this could reap Tripoli's new rulers some US$50 billion annually. Most estimates place oil reserves at 46.4 billion barrels.

The "rebels" of new Libya better not mess with China. Five months ago, China's official policy was already to call for a ceasefire; if that had happened, Gaddafi would still control more than half of Libya. Yet Beijing - never a fan of violent regime change - for the moment is exercising extreme restraint.

Wen Zhongliang, the deputy head of the Ministry of Trade, willfully observed, "Libya will continue to protect the interests and rights of Chinese investors and we hope to continue investment and economic cooperation." Official statements are piling up emphasizing "mutual economic cooperation".

Last week, Abdel Hafiz Ghoga, vice president of the dodgy Transitional National Council (TNC), told Xinhua that all deals and contracts agreed with the Gaddafi regime would be honored - but Beijing is taking no chances.

Libya supplied no more than 3% of China's oil imports in 2010. Angola is a much more crucial supplier. But China is still Libya's top oil customer in Asia. Moreover, China could be very helpful in the infrastructure rebuilding front, or in the technology export - no less than 75 Chinese companies with 36,000 employees were already on the ground before the outbreak of the tribal/civil war, swiftly evacuated in less than three days.

The Russians - from Gazprom to Tafnet - had billions of dollars invested in Libyan projects; Brazilian oil giant Petrobras and the construction company Odebrecht also had intrests there. It's still unclear what will happen to them. The director general of the Russia-Libya Business Council, Aram Shegunts, is extremely worried: "Our companies will lose everything because NATO will prevent them from doing business in Libya."

Italy seems to have passed the "rebel" version of "you're either with us or without us". Energy giant ENI apparently won't be affected, as Premier Silvio "Bunga Bunga" Berlusconi pragmatically dumped his previous very close pal Gaddafi at the start of the Africom/NATO bombing spree.

ENI's directors are confident Libya's oil and gas flows to southern Italy will resume before winter. And the Libyan ambassador in Italy, Hafed Gaddur, reassured Rome that all Gaddafi-era contracts will be honored. Just in case, Berlusconi will meet the TNC's prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, this Thursday in Milan.

Bin Laden to the rescue Turkey's Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu - of the famed "zero problems with our neighbors" policy - has also been gushing praise on the former "rebels" turned powers-that-be. Eyeing the post-Gaddafi business bonanza as well, Ankara - as NATO's eastern flank - ended up helping to impose a naval blockade on the Gaddafi regime, carefully cultivated the TNC, and in July formally recognized it as the government of Libya. Business "rewards" loom.

Then there's the crucial plot; how the House of Saud is going to profit from having been instrumental in setting up a friendly regime in Libya, possibly peppered with Salafi notables; one of the key reasons for the Saudi onslaught - which included a fabricated vote at the Arab League - was the extreme bad blood between Gaddafi and King Abdullah since the run-up towards the war on Iraq in 2002.

It's never enough to stress the cosmic hypocrisy of an ultra-regressive absolute monarchy/medieval theocracy - which invaded Bahrain and repressed its native Shi'ites - saluting what could be construed as a pro-democracy movement in Northern Africa.

Anyway, it's time to party. Expect the Saudi Bin Laden Group to reconstruct like mad all over Libya - eventually turning the (looted) Bab al-Aziziyah into a monster, luxury Mall of Tripolitania.

Pepe Escobar is the author of Globalistan: How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War (Nimble Books, 2007) and Red Zone Blues: a snapshot of Baghdad during the surge. His new book, just out, is Obama does Globalistan (Nimble Books, 2009).

The Gaddafi regime carried out an extraordinary clandestine lobbying operation to try to stop Nato's bombardment of Libya, and believed the western allies were likely to launch a full-scale invasion in "either late September or October".

Secret documents in Tripoli seen by the Guardian reveal the desperate attempts made by the Libyan government in its final months to influence US and world opinion. It approached key international opinion formers from the US president Barack Obama downwards.

The regime tried to persuade the Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich – a well-known rebel who voted against Nato military action in Libya, and opposed the Iraq war – to visit Tripoli as part of a hastily arranged "peace mission". The Libyan government offered to pay all Kucinich's costs related to the trip, including "travel expenses and accommodation".

On 22 June a letter sent to Libya's prime minister, Al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi, by a US-based lobbyist for the regime, Sufyan Omeish, noted that Kucinich was "concerned that his personal safety in Tripoli could not be guaranteed". He preferred to conduct meetings with regime officials outside Libya. The plan was for Kucinich to meet "senior Libyan officials, including Gaddafi". The proposed trip never took place. Kucinich visited Syria instead.

He confirmed the invitation and said he had discussed it directly with the Libyan prime minister, but ultimately declined because of security concerns.

"Because of the efforts I had made early on to bring an end to the war, I started to get calls from Libya, including from the prime minister," the congressman told the Guardian. "He had taken note of the fact I was making an effort to put forward a peace proposal. I had several requests to go to Libya. I made it clear I could not negotiate on behalf of the administration. I said I was speaking as a member of Congress involved in the issue and willing to listen to what they had to say. But given that Libyan was under attack, it did not seem a promising place to hold meetings."

He said that on one occasion he held an hour-long telephone conversation with the prime minister. He also confirmed Omeish had been in touch, acting as an intermediary for and supporter of the regime.

On 23 June the prime minister – who has since fled to Tunisia – wrote a surprisingly sycophantic letter to Obama. He addressed him as "Mr President", and politely complained about Washington's "unprecedented decision" to confiscate the Libyan regime's assets – "to please" the rebels. He also wrote to leading members of the US Congress, chiding Republican John Boehner after he described a letter by Gaddafi as "incoherent".

The documents surfaced in a city still subject to a power struggle between rebel fighters and remnants of Gaddafi's security forces, who exchanged fire for much of the day around a cluster of multi-storey blocks of flats in north Tripoli, the site of a last stand by some loyalists.

Rebels also closed in on pro-Gaddafi strongholds in Sirte and Sabha.

Last night the opposition National Transitional Council (NTC) consolidated its control when Ali Tarhouni, the finance minister of the NTC cabinet, told a press conference the cabinet is moving immediately to Tripoli from the eastern city of Benghazi. The NTC also scored a significant diplomatic victory when a Security Council committee last night agreed to unblock $1.5bn (

The African Union has declined to recognize Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC) as the legitimate government of the North African nation.

South African President Jacob Zuma, who is also currently the chairman of the AU, said at the end of an AU Peace and Security Council meeting in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa on Friday that the Libyan opposition fighters were “not yet legitimate,” AFP reported.

“There is a process in Libya wherein the NTC forces are in the process of taking over Tripoli, but there is still fighting going on,” Zuma stated.

AU Peace and Security Commissioner Ramtane Lamamra said the bloc “encourages the Libyan stakeholders to accelerate the process leading to the formation of an all-inclusive transitional government that would be welcome to occupy a seat in the African Union.”

Several African countries have already recognized the NTC.

Rwandan Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo said on Friday that the AU “should offer support to the National Transitional Council.”

NTC officials announced on Thursday that they had moved the transitional government from the eastern city of Benghazi to Tripoli.

Meanwhile, Libyan opposition fighters took control of the Ras Ajdir crossing on the border with Tunisia on Friday, according to a Tunisian government source.

The fighters advanced into the heart of the Libyan capital Tripoli early on Monday and seized control of much of the city without meeting significant resistance from regime forces.

They are now facing only small pockets of resistance from forces loyal to fugitive ruler Muammar Gaddafi in other areas.

However, opposition fighters have not managed to find Gaddafi yet and his exact whereabouts are still unknown.

CIA recruits 1,500 from Mazar-e-Sharif to fight in LibyaBy: Azhar Masood | Published: August 31, 2011 ISLAMABAD – The Central Intelligence Agency of the United States recruited over 1,500 men from Mazar-e-Sharif for fighting against the Qaddafi forces in Libya.Sources told TheNation: “Most of the men have been recruited from Afghanistan. They are Uzbeks, Persians and Hazaras. According to the footage, these men attired in Uzbek-style of shalwar and Hazara-Uzbek Kurta were found fighting in Libyan cities.”When Al-Jazeera reporter pointed it he was disallowed by the ‘rebels ‘to capture images.Sources in Quetta said: “Some Uzbeks and Hazaras from Afghanistan were arrested in Balochistan for illegally traveling into Pakistan en route to Libya through Iran. Aljazeera’s report gave credence to this story. More than 60 Afghans, mainly children and teenagers, have been found dead after suffocating inside a shipping container in southwestern Pakistan in an apparent human smuggling attempt.More than 100 illegal immigrants were discovered 20km from the border town of Quetta last week inside the container, which had been locked from the outside.Aljazeera having dubious record gave human touch to this story as most of the men who intruded inside Pakistan from Afghanistan were recruits for Libyan Rebels’ Force.The sources said: “The CIA funded Libyan Rebels with cash and weapons.” In a report the New York Mayor’s TV Channel Bloomberg said, “Leaders of the Libyan rebels’ Transitional National Council flew to Istanbul seeking legitimacy and money. They will leave with the official recognition of the US and 31 other nations. As for the cash, they will have to wait.The decision to treat the council as the “legitimate governing authority” in Libya is a key step to freeing up some of the government’s frozen assets for rebels seeking the ouster of Muammar Qaddafi. Still, obstacles such as existing United Nations sanctions won’t disappear overnight.“We still have to work through various legal issues, but we expect this recognition will allow the TNC to access various forms of funding,” said US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.At stake are about $34 billion in frozen Libyan government assets that are held by the US institutions and as much as $130 billion more held around the world. Speaking via phone from Istanbul, Transitional National Council spokesman Mahmoud Shammam put the total in excess of $100 billion globally.Qaddafi, in an audio message broadcast to supporters in the town of Zlitan, said the Libyan people “will never give up” in the fight to prevent him being ousted, the Associated Press reported. “The Libyan people will persevere,” he said.In the coming weeks, the US officials will consult with the TNC and international partners on the most effective and appropriate method of making additional significant financial assistance available, according to a Treasury official who was not authorised to discuss the matter publicly.Shammam said the TNC needs $3 billion to cover the budget for six months. The council is seeking loans secured by the Qaddafi regime’s assets abroad as a means of funding, he said.Recognition may lawfully allow nations to buy state-owned oil from the TNC, which controls the oil-rich eastern part of the country. Italy’s Eni SpA and France’s Total SA are the top oil companies operating in Libya, a former Italian colony.How much money the Benghazi-based government can get, and when, may be more tied to politics than the law.“The legal issues are in the eye of the beholder,” said Gary Clyde Hufbauer, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. “If Obama and Clinton want to go slow in paying out the money, their lawyers can invent plenty of legal issues to justify the chosen pace.” The US envisions a “short timeframe” for releasing some of the Libyan government assets frozen by the US, State Department spokesman Mark Toner said.President Barack Obama signed an order on February 25 freezing any US assets of Muammar Qaddafi, his family and members of his regime in Libya. As a practical matter, most of the frozen $34 billion is tied up in complicated property interests, including ownership interests in non-publicly traded companies or real estate, according to the Treasury official.The mechanics of how the US will unfreeze assets still has to be worked out. The United Nations sanctions against Libya remain in place, a hindrance to efforts to get money to the rebels.The UK and France, which led the campaign to unseat Qaddafi, yesterday didn’t commit any financial contributions.Recognition of the council “will allow some countries to unfreeze some money,” French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said. Libyan frozen assets in France total $250 million, he said.Other nations have already found the means to act.Italy will open a credit line to rebels using frozen assets as collateral, and will provide them with 100 million euros ($141 million), Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said yesterday. Another 300 million euros will be released in two weeks and in total, Italy will release 400 million euros, he said, describing the money as loans.The council is expecting $100 million from Turkey within three days, Shammam said.The main criterion for international law for the recognition of a rebel group as the government of a state is its effective control over the territory.The recognition of the TNC, given the fact that Qaddafi still controls Tripoli, could “arguably constitute an illegal interference in internal affairs,” Stefan Talmon, a professor of International Law at the University of Oxford, wrote in a paper for the American Society of International Law.A number of actions by the rebels convinced the US to offer recognition, including a commitment to pursue a reform process, and to seek more inclusive representation of Libyans, politically, geographically and tribally,” according to a State Department officially.The US will continue to watch closely how they perform, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.The contact group laid out conditions for a “genuine ceasefire” in a final statement and declared that “Qaddafi and certain of his family members must go.”The way he will leave power has yet to be defined, the group said. The ceasefire conditions call for complete withdrawal of Qaddafi-led forces to their bases, the release of detainees and hostages, provision of water and electricity to all regions, and the opening of all borders for the quick return of refugees.The North Atlantic Treaty Organization started air strikes in late March to protect civilians, an intervention that aided rebels seeking Qaddafi’s ouster. Qaddafi has already lasted longer than allies had anticipated, though his hold on the capital, Tripoli, appears to be weakening amid shortages of food and fuel. There are reports that his government is seeking a political solution to end the fighting.UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be the only person authorized by the contact group to negotiate with both sides in Libya. Ban will set up a board of two to three interlocutors from Tripoli and the rebel-held town of Benghazi, Frattini said.The military campaign against Qaddafi will continue “indefinitely” until he steps down, UK Foreign Secretary William Hague told reporters yesterday in Istanbul.

On Monday in Misrata more than 500 Libyans held their first demonstration against the new interim government. The protest materialised after the National Transitional Council lined up Albarrani Shkal, a former Gaddafi general, as head of security in the capital, Tripoli.

On the one hand, Shkal's appointment can be considered a positive and necessary move: integrating former regime loyalists will be integral to the building of a stable Libya, lest these loyalists become disenfranchised and seek to undermine stability as a means of remedying their marginalisation.

However, it will be difficult to apply such arguments in the case of top-tier loyalists who either refused to switch sides, switched sides too late or who have the blood of too many innocent civilians on their hands.

Many Libyans will feel that these objections apply to Shkal, who only defected to the opposition in May and had been operations officer for the brutal and infamous 32nd brigade led by Gaddafi's son Khamis responsible for the death of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of innocent civilians.

But the protests should not be taken at face value. The challenge of securing Tripoli and the broader country is made difficult by the divided interests, ambitions and loyalties within the anti-Gaddafi forces.

Although there has to be continuity in the security establishment – that is, retaining former regime military personnel and law enforcement officers – the process of doing so will depend on whether the NTC can actually organise the thousands of fighters that it calls the "official" NTC army but which actually constitutes an array of disparate military units.

"Free Libya" fighting groups have been developed from the bottom up and independently of one another, with the two primary fighting forces coming from the east (the original and official NTC army) and the west, which over the past few weeks made the most decisive contribution to the conflict by tightening the noose around Tripoli.

There has been some co-ordination between the two groups but a unified command structure integrating them both does not exist.

What will compound this organisational gap is the series of figures contesting for the top job of military chief. Before his suspicious death, former regime interior minister Abdul Fatah Younes was the opposition army commander in Benghazi. However, he was challenged for this position by the experienced, and influential, Khalifa Hifter, as well as Omar al-Hariri (both Benghazi based).

But groups in the west also have their own battle-hardened leaders, including Anwar Fekini, a former lawyer who has led the resistance from the west, where the rebellion was fiercest and also comprised of the Berber minority that has long been neglected and repressed by the regime but who now make up some of the most effective fighting units.

So far, brigades in both Misrata (located in the east) and the Nafusa mountains (the west) have refused to either recognise the authority of the NTC or reject the notion that they unreservedly take orders from NTC leaders. On Monday, for example, Misrata's ruling council warned that if Shkal's appointment was confirmed then its military units would refuse to follow NTC orders.

Similarly, little has been said about the Islamist groups who could also end up undermining post-Gaddafi Libya.

This is not necessarily because the Islamists may end up being serious contenders in the political arena but because they have some of the most effective, organised and heavily armed military brigades that have acted independently of the NTC.

As well as having the death of Younes attributed to them, the Islamists gained further recognition of their strength in the recently released draft constitution, which regards Islamic jurisprudence (sharia) as "the principal source of legislation" – clearly a measure of appeasement.

Balancing these divided interests will further depend on whether the NTC is able to reconcile its own political differences, given that it comprises an array of individuals with conflicting political and ideological ambitions. There is also the question of whether they can organise themselves quickly enough to manage the overwhelming logistical and organisational demands that come with the paying of salaries and the immediate provision of basic services and humanitarian assistance – for the entire country.

There is still reason to be more than just cautiously optimistic, though. Libya is no Iraq. There is little room for any sectarian or ethnic violence to erupt and no ethnic or sectarian transfer of power. People will grind their axes, that is inevitable, and politics may turn violent, but the worst can be avoided if competing interests and ambitions are balanced – which is possible, since there is enough to go around for everyone.

Besides though, vic. No one is paying attention anymore. The white house could have launched a full scale ground invasion (instead of the covert ground invasion) and nobody in this country would really flinch besides the same handful of us that still GAFS.

"What do these seven countries have in common? In the context of banking, one that sti...cks out is that none of them is listed amongst the 56 member banks of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). That evidently puts them outside the long regulatory arm of the central bankers' central bank in Switzerland.

The most renegade of the lot could be Libya and Iraq, the two that have actually been attacked. Kenneth Schortgen Jr, writing on Examiner.com, noted that "[s]ix months before the US moved into Iraq to take down Saddam Hussein, the oil nation had made the move to accept euros instead of dollars for oil, and this became a threat to the global dominance of the dollar as the reserve currency, and its dominion as the petrodollar."

The leader of Libya's transitional government used his first speech in Tripoli to call for unity and moderation as he sought to allay fears of factional splits among the country's new rulers.

Mustafa Abdul Jalil, chairman of the national transitional council, addressed a crowd of about 10,000 people in the renamed Martyrs Square on Monday night.

Amid fears that differences could now spill over between the NTC, which was originally based in Benghazi, and other rebel factions, Jalil was at pains to stress the moderate credentials of the new Libya.

He said Islamic sharia law should be the main source of legislation but added: "We will not accept any extremist ideology, on the right or the left. We are a Muslim people, for a moderate Islam, and will stay on this road."

Jalil also emphasised that women had played an important part in the revolution and would continue to do so.

"Women will be ambassadors," he said to cheers from women and girls in the crowd waving flags. "Women will be ministers." Many of the women were dressed in the red, black and green of the revolution.

Among the prominent Islamist figures is Abdul Hakim Belhaj, a former member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a militant organisation that long opposed Gaddafi, and now the commander of the Tripoli military council, which has called for resignation of Mahmoud Jibril, the US-educated acting prime minister.

One source close to the NTC told the Associated Press: "Abdul Jalil is trying to keep the peace, and it's a struggle between both sides, between the two powerful camps. He's trying to maintain a balance between the two camps, and keep the international community happy. It's very difficult."

In his Martyrs Square speech, Jalil pointedly praised the different groups involved in toppling Gaddafi, including those who were not under the direct control of the council in Benghazi, some of whom feel they have not been given their fair share of credit for their part in the uprising. The co-founder of the February 17 coalition – a reference to the date of the first uprising – last week criticised the performance of the NTC's executive committee. Saoud Elhafi said he was particularly unhappy about the appointment of ministers "without consulting us or other organisations. From what I see, they are a bunch of businesspeople."

Jalil's message of reconciliation extended to the remaining Gaddafi forces and the families of former government figures who, he said, should not be held responsible for the crimes of their relatives. "We are Muslims, people of forgiveness," he said, urging people to let the law run its course.

His appeal came on the eve of publication of an Amnesty International report which found that rebels as well as pro-Gaddafi forces perpetrated killings, torture and other abuses during the uprising against the Libyan regime.

Jalil said he was confident that the remaining resistance by Gaddafi loyalists would soon be overcome. "Bani Walid, Sirte and Sabha are now under siege by Gaddafi forces," he said. "We are betting that our brothers in those cities will fulfil their expectations and you will see them do so soon."

http://en.wikipedia...._Fighting_GroupLIFG was banned worldwide (as an affiliate of al-Qaeda) by the UN 1267 Committee.[2] Listed at the Foreign Terrorist Organizations,[3] the group has denied ever being affiliated with al-Qaeda, stating that it refused to join the global Islamic front Osama bin Laden declared against the west in 1998.....[4]

..On October 10, 2005, the United Kingdom's Home Office banned LIFG and fourteen other militant groups from operating in the UK. Under the United Kingdom's Terrorism Act 2000, being a member of a LIFG is punishable with a 10-year prison term.....

"What do these seven countries have in common? In the context of banking, one that sti...cks out is that none of them is listed amongst the 56 member banks of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). That evidently puts them outside the long regulatory arm of the central bankers' central bank in Switzerland.

The most renegade of the lot could be Libya and Iraq, the two that have actually been attacked. Kenneth Schortgen Jr, writing on Examiner.com, noted that "[s]ix months before the US moved into Iraq to take down Saddam Hussein, the oil nation had made the move to accept euros instead of dollars for oil, and this became a threat to the global dominance of the dollar as the reserve currency, and its dominion as the petrodollar."

Isn't it great how we can spend a billion dollars helping a terrorist organization by bombing one country while at the same time spending billions of dollars helping another country by bombing a terrorist organization

It's all about who gets to make the rules. What becomes even more ridiculous, is the idea that any of these actions help the interests of the american people. It's hogwash. So many are blinded under a false pretense. Lies built on lies built on lies. You know what they say about liars.....

The powers that control our military inventions, be it open or covert, work for their own interests and nothing more. We are less free than we were in 2001, less secure and wholey divided as a nation.

I was reading a Democracy Now! piece and this was someone's response. I think it sums things up pretty well.

NATO went into Libya for 2 main reasons, neither had anything to do with dead protestors...NATO went into Libya, first of all, to stop Gadaffi from convincing African Nations of adopting the Gold Dinar as a standard currency, which would acually be made out of gold... He was also going to demand that oil payments be in the Dinar and not in shit green backs that arent worth the paper they are printed on... the second obvious reason was the Oil...has anyone noticed all the reports of France and England clamoring over the spoils of war, trying to out do each other on who helped Libya more, so they get the oil concessions? the third piece is the gold itself...where is it? I assume everyone is going to say that Gadaffi Stole it all.. YES ALL 140 TONS OF IT... Now to the last, and most important piece, which I left out of the equation, simply because most people will laugh at me for saying it. But they are destroying Libya to have a further grip on the region, especially now that Israel is faltering, and Egypt is no longer a strong country, in alliance with the US and Israel. I cant believe that a high school drop out can put these pieces together. Come on people. Yes, I believed the lies regarding this Libyan Conflict, but now I see the full picture.

Not to be a naysayer again, but that response is pretty lame, IMO. The dinar as a standard currency? lol. Oil is certainly a driving factor, but the Libyan oil isn't prime for the U.S. market. It's a different grade - the Italian and French refineries are geared up to process it, we're not.

Next fight on the horizon: Morocco. Do you know that they are the world's leading supplier of phosphorous? Like 85% of it? Without phosphorous, agriculture is phucked. Without phosphorous, there is no DNA...